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NEW YORK — A moderate earthquake has shaken the northeastern Japanese prefecture where the much more massive earthquake and tsunami touched off the worst nuclear crisis since Chernobyl earlier this year.

The 5.2-magnitude quake struck Fukushima Prefecture overnight just after 2 a.m. local time Wednesday (12 p.m. ET Tuesday). Its epicenter was on the coast near the town of Iwaki, 115 miles north of Tokyo.

Fukushima was severely hit by the quake and tsunami in March that left more than 21,000 people dead or missing.

The Wednesday quake was about 70 miles of the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear facility.

Another 5.3 quake later Wednesday hit 262 miles southwest of Tokyo, off the Japan coast.

Copyright 2011 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Video: Debris from Japanese tsunami could hit US

Transcript of: Debris from Japanese tsunami could hit US

BRIAN WILLIAMS, anchor:Almost seven months now since the devastating earthquake and the resulting

tsunami in Japan. The numbers are still staggering from there:more than 15,000 people dead, 130,000 people forced from their homes, and tonight an amazing kind of environmental delayed reaction. A huge island of trash and debris from the quake drifting across the
Pacific Ocean
toward US shores.
NBC
's
Kate Snow
with us here in studio with more on this.
Kate
:

KATE SNOW reporting:Brian
, just after the tsunami hit, scientists at the
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
and the
University of Hawaii
started making models using calculations based on tides and currents to project where all that debris from
Japan
would end up. But now they have proof, sightings from a ship telling them where potentially millions of tons of trash is and where it's headed. March 11th,
Tsunami
waves crash over
Japan
, wiping out entire communities, sweeping everything that isn't nailed down out to sea. More than 300,000 buildings, cars, boats, refrigerators, furniture, you name it. And this is where it all is today, giant fields of floating debris in the middle of the
Pacific Ocean
.

Mr. MIKE BECK (The Nature Conservancy Lead Marine Scientist):The area that we're talking about that this debris is floating within is something on the order of twice the size of
Texas
.

SNOW:US Navy
ships have had to steer around the islands of garbage, and now the discovery that it's moving faster than scientists had expected. They now project some of it will hit the
Midway Islands
by January. Currents would sweep it to the
US West Coast
in
2013
and back to the
Hawaiian Islands
in
2014
and
2015
.

Mr. BECK:I'm very concerned about the impact. The everyday pollution from refrigerators and televisions and ports, that's a lot of toxic chemicals that are going to stress our marine life and habitats even more than they already are.

SNOW:Last month scientists at the
University of Hawaii
asked the crew on board this historic Russian tall ship the
Pallada
to document what they saw as they sailed from
Honolulu
to
Vladivostok
,
Russia
. Just past the
Midway Islands
, they couldn't miss the mess. The boat's crew made notes about appliances, boards, plastic bottles, buoys from fishing nets, drums, boots. A
fishing boat
they hoisted up left no doubt about where it all came from. The markings say
Fukushima Prefecture
.
Government
scientists stress that this isn't a wave of debris that will hit all at once, but all this trash could affect coastal habitats, wildlife, boaters, as well. They're also asking
West Coast
and
Hawaii
residents to help them track this trash,
Brian
. You can learn more about that on our website. Of course, that's nbcnightlynews.com.